Thursday, 18 July 2013

The Wedding Cake Saga - Part 1 - Planning

Originally, there was talk of having a fruit cake base, and two or three tiers on top of that. While this would have been excellent structurally speaking, I saw that major problems would arise over matching icing colours. I was adamant from the start that if I was making this cake it would be covered in buttercream, not fondant. I hate the stuff, and there would have been a much greater chance of the cake looking a bit amateur. Because you can't shouldn't ice a fruit cake in buttercream, we were then only left with royal icing. Which I was up for. Until I realised that a pure white royal icing base would look really, really strange if it was topped with tiers iced in off-white buttercream. Many cake arguments ensued. I don't even like fruit cake, and neither does my brother's fiance. He was fighting a losing battle from the start. So, I got my way! and as a consolation I suggested they have a separate traditional fruitcake if my brother insists on it. Tantrums were thrown (Peter). They're already planning on having a cheese cake on the cake table as well, why not add a third?

yes, it's a cake...made of cheese.

So, with the go ahead, last night I had the fun task of attempting to work out the quantities of ingredients needed. This was not easy. Especially as, because I want to make different flavours for each layer, I didn't have exact sized recipes to follow. So there was a lot of guess work there.

Because this cake is just a rookie test run, I'm taking complete creative control, and I decided to have some fun with the flavours and fillings. I'm making three tiers, of 10, 8 and 6 inches, which will be chocolate, vanilla and lemon sponges in that order. The chocolate layer will be filled with a baileys liquor buttercream, the vanilla with a combination of white chocolate buttercream and a berry jam I made last week, and the lemon sponge will be sandwiched with a homemade lemon curd buttercream.

balieys buttercream

As I'm planning on covering the whole cake in Swiss meringue buttercream (let's be honest no one likes fondant, it's goopy, too sweet, and a pain to work with) I realise I'll need a lot of egg whites. About 12. Just for icing. Which will leave me with 12 egg yolks. Hopefully I'll think of something fun to do with those! Those eggs combined with the ones actually needed to make the cake brings me to about 30 eggs. I'll also need nine packs of butter. Guess who's gonna look the freak walking around Asda...Fun.

About Me

I'm Catrin, an English Literature student currently studying in Cornwall, Enlgand. This amateur food blog is a way of documenting my culinary successes and kitchen failures, in the hopes of communicating the joys of baking with all who will listen. Blog entries may be sporadic, but my passion for pastries and cakes is very real!
Thank you for visiting!